Why SaaS Startups Start At Rackspace

Though we work with many large enterprises, as a former startup ourselves, we are passionate about helping new businesses access the infrastructure needed to build out their dreams. More so than other business models, a SaaS application provider’s infrastructure is akin to the storefront of a brick and mortar business. If the windows are dirty and customers can’t get in the front door, your store won’t thrive. Similarly, if an app is plagued with slow response and frequent downtime due to inefficient infrastructure planning, your app is likely to wind up dead the water.

I could give you dozen of reasons why Rackspace is the perfect incubator for your budding web app, but for the sake of brevity, I’ll run through the top five:

Instant Scale: Whether load testing or taking on a real unexpected traffic spike, you have access to massive infrastructure resources at your fingertips. And, unlike traditional hardware or dedicated resources, you have the flexibility of instantly tapping extra resources to carry you through a spike without being financially or physically stuck with unused hardware or a long-term commitment to capacity you no longer need.

CAPEX Savings: Keeping the balance sheet balanced is just as much of a priority as perfecting your code when you’re starting up. Making capital investments in architecture can put you in the hole before your first customer signs up. By converting that CAPEX investment into a fixed monthly expense, you’re likely to spend less time in the red paying off hardware and achieve profitability faster.

Startup Support: Our industry recognized Rackspace Startup Program[1] has helped many SaaS operators, like YouGotListings[2], break into and claim their place in the SaaS market. Coupled with world-renowned Fanatical Support[3], startups get the help they need to get up and stay running.

Broad Portfolio: We’re built to serve entrepreneurs from their first server all the way up to the complex, multi-server configurations SaaS applications need to successfully compete in the market. Rackspace serves as a single provider solution for your entire infrastructure including compute, storage, databases, networks and more.

We’re Open: Running our cloud on OpenStack[4], the largest open cloud in production, gives you the advantage of web scale with the freedom to focus on coding your application without worrying about how or if you can move the application in the future.

For more reasons, give us a call to discuss the unique needs of your SaaS application[5] and how our open cloud solutions can help you stay lean as you move from startup to started. I’ll be back next week to talk you about using cloud to gain maximum resource efficiency in your SaaS application.

Trey is a cloud evangelist with the Rackspace Startup Program. Check out the previous post in his SaaS series on scaling your SaaS app in the cloud[6]. In his next post, Trey discusses how the cloud can improve the resource utilization of your SaaS app[7]. Find out more about hosting your SaaS application at Rackspace[8].